I'll Save Your Bones
by Shadsie
Summary: In which Tharja takes one of her battle-cries a little too literally...
**Disclaimer:** _Fire Emblem: Awakening_ belongs to Nintendo and related entities. No profit is sought.

 **Notes (VERY IMPORTANT):** I am currently recovering from a grave illness. It was something that was sudden, hard and fast and hit me like a ton of bricks. Note, kids, that certain medications (such as lithium carbonate) and random tract-infections out of nowhere do not mix. Pay attention to your fevers and don't hesitate to go to the emergency room if you feel you need to – it just may save your life. I literally almost died. I spent eight days in the hospital. As such, I spent the first three into four of those days going from a person who "has never hallucinated" to living in a Salvador Dali painting. As such, I have been very concerned with "getting my brain back" (even more than getting my kidneys back). I dredged my brain for one of those ideas I had on the back-burner to do that I "probably would never get around to" in order to write up as a minor test of my cognitive faculties. As such, dear readers, especially those of you who are regular readers of mine and know my style, can you help me out here? If you notice any significant mistakes or wonkiness (beyond the usual typos), I'd like to know about it. This is a small way of gauging my intellectual functioning. Thank you. I've been told that I'm "back," but I want to make sure.

For the purposes of storytelling: Default female-version Robin – married to Chrom. Everything else is up for interpretation.

* * *

 **I'LL SAVE YOUR BONES**

 **A Fire Emblem: Awakening short by Shadsie**

It honestly was not a line that Tharja had ever thought about very much when she used it in battle. It merely was her way of wishing a comrade well in a fight – a creepy way, perhaps, but all her own. Everyone in the Shepherds seemed to have an implicit understanding that she meant that she was going to do her best as a supporter to help a fellow soldier keep their bones within their body. Chrom gave her funny looks, even long after he should have gotten used to the line and Tharja's manner. Henry thought it was awesome.

The bones that Tharja had perhaps longed to protect above all other parts in all other people were Robin's bones. The tactician had, from what the dark mage could see, bulging beneath skin and partial-gloves, some very beautiful skeletal structure. She had a nice, pert little chin, good nose-structure and wonderful cheekbones. Then again, in Tharja's eyes, everything about Robin was glorious. Robin might not have ever agreed, considering herself "compromised" for the lack of memories from what had obviously been the majority of her life, but, to Tharja, she was just the "perfect specimen" of a human.

Perhaps it was a darkness resting within Robin that Tharja sensed and responded to. The mage thought of this often in hindsight. No… there had to be more. The Shepherds' tactician was brilliant and brave and carried with her a certain…defiance…of that dark whiff of spiritual smoke that always hovered around her. As always, the love and admiration was mixed with jealousy. Tharja cringed whenever she saw that beautiful idiot-child of hers in camp – the boy, though strangely enough, not the girl. The black sorceress tended to see Lucina as "Chrom's girl," while it was Morgan who'd belonged more to Robin in her eyes. Tharja could not give her a future-child like that and couldn't help but see Chrom in the boy's hair and in the structure of his chin. He served as a bitter reminder of everything she could not have; still, she stayed her hand on laying any curses upon him. He was "of Robin" and therefore personally off-limits for "practice."

No, she saved that for her husband, though it was more of a matter of the lunk getting in the way of her project of making their future daughter stronger and more resilient. It was perhaps a strange form of love to abuse Noire so, but being born into a house of constant cursing had made Tharja strong and was the only thing that she knew.

The most powerful magic for any kind of hex or spell, as any dark mage knew, lay in items pertaining to the body of the intended victim. General elemental spells, as read from tomes of wind, thunder and fire had their own character about them, but the so-called "black" magic was largely a biological form of magic. A master sorcerer was meant to have an inscrutable and solid mind and a toughness of the body would follow. Doing some hex-practice upon Noire using bits of hair, dandruff and scavenged blood from fresh wounds taken from the bandages of the medical tent gave her ample strength to use upon Robin. While everyone else who practiced the dark arts had been forbidden by the superior mage to lay any curses upon the tactician (which certainly wouldn't have been a good idea in the least, anyway, what with her being the army's tactician), Tharja reserved a certain window of practice for herself. Of course, this was because, unlike Henry, she felt she could actually trust herself to hex Robin in a way that would be ultimately harmless.

This mainly had to do with ill-done "love" and lust spells. Tharja would convince Gaius to procure a long white hair for her from one of Robin's combs. The resulting spell cast with the hair would carry the intent to have the woman meet Tharja by chance in the barracks or camp while filled with longing and stirrings of key components of her body. Occasionally a "chance meeting" would take place, but as far as Tharja getting anything she wanted out of her silver bird, it seemed that the hex never ended in anything other than Robin "rushing off to a strategy-meeting" in Lord Chrom's tent. Clearly, Tharja decided, she would have to step up her game if she were to beat her tactician in the arts of love and war. She may have to find blood or a swath of skin should Lady Robin become injured on the battlefield if she were to try any greater magic than the pecking and dodging she was playing at.

Then the day came when Robin nearly got her spellcasting hand blown off.

The army had sought to make a crossing over a river when they found a town beset by Risen. The army of Risen was a small one, but brutal and there was but one old man who remained a survivor among the civilians of the area. The Shepherds went to work, anyway. Even with almost no one left to save, the one life they could preserve was worth it and the undead monsters needed to be wiped out wherever they'd created a nest.

Robin did her usual work of a frontline commander, fighting as well as issuing orders. She engaged a Risen mage bearing a mid-level fire-based tome and she took him on, uncharacteristic for her, alone. She braced her back against the rest of the Shepherds' line and tried to draw the mage away from the rest of the troops, perhaps because she'd seen the kind of tome the zombie had and noticed it as a forged piece or some such thing. Robin had clearly sensed something a bit off about the Risen. She used a bolt of Thoron on him gracefully, but before the creature crumbled into smoke and dust, it unleashed its own spell. Tharja watched as the whole thing happened. Robin braced her hand out to shield herself with her book – perhaps a poor move, but something fairly instinctual. The spell landed home and dissipated against the back of Robin's tome, but not before there was a horrifying crack and squelch.

The Thoron tome disintegrated into a ball of fire immediately. Robin dropped the ashen pages and simply stared for a moment at her bloody hand, her pinky-finger distinctly absent. She did not scream or cry out. The tactician didn't even curse. Chrom rushed to her and caught her before she fell into the mud. After that came the roar of agony, followed by Lissa and Libra – having taken care of the last of the Risen soldiers – running up to her and swiftly applying the blessing of their healing-staves. Robin was quickly wrapped up and taken to the healers' tent of their latest camp. The battle was over and there wasn't much to do other than for the group to see to their wounded – of which Robin was the only person to bear a significant injury.

Tharja lurked in the shadows outside the tent, creeping between fresh water barrels. She heard the soft, yet dour voice of Libra speaking inside. "I am afraid there is nothing to be done that we have not done already," he said.

"We stitched ya up real good," Brady added. "It's pretty much up to you to keep it clean and wrapped."

"But…" Robin ventured.

"Yeah!" Lissa piped up, "Robin is a tome-user! She needs to be able to use her fingers to cast spells!"

"I am afraid that even if we found the pinky finger," Libra intoned, "That it would be too late to re-attach it. I regret to say that you have suffered something crippling, Lady Robin. The best we can do is to get you healed and to restore mobility in the majority of the hand."

Robin signed in frustration. "I think I'll be alright," she said. "I'm sure I can teach myself to compensate for the loss in spellcasting."

"She did teach herself lances from scratch when she reclassed to a Dark Flier status for a while," Chrom said. "You can do this, Robin – but take it easy. Let yourself heal."

"I suppose I can confine myself to the War Tent for a while," Robin concluded.

"You must rest!" Libra ordered.

"I can assist," Laurent added. "Please allow me to help you in any way you see fit."

"Thank you," Robin said, presumably to everyone there in the tent with her.

"Well, this is just great," Tharja groused, biting her lip. "A crippled tactician, taking a header in magic-use… Wonderful. There were mages in Plegia who are put to sleep for such injuries. Well, making my dear Robin a sacrifice to Grima just won't do, now will it? Not on my watch."

She walked away from the tent. "I'll have to watch her with extra vigilance in the night. So much blood-loss. Henry would be impressed. It was a good thing that he stayed out of the battle today. He would have been insufferable."

The dark mage found herself wandering back to the battlefield. The shell-shocked old man who'd survived the Risen-rampage had been taken to the mess tent where he was being given counsel and supper. The field was pristine – with green grass and white flowers waving in the breeze. The Risen had a tendency to dematerialize into ashes and to blow away upon the wind; depending upon how long the bodies had been dead and how much entropy they had suffered. Freshly-dead soldiers tended to leave interesting bits and parts that she (and Henry especially) enjoyed using for experiments. Tharja scoured the field, letting her gaze rest upon the mud between the grass-stalks just to see if she might spy a bit of Risen suitable for creating curses to deliver upon hapless Valmese soldiers.

As it was, it appeared that all of today's undead warriors had been of the aged variety – dry and smoky. Nothing useful was found, that is, until Tharja found an especially fresh piece of flesh.

"Ho, ho! What is this?" she asked herself as she picked up the blood-stained object. She smiled as she curiously played with the tiny appendage, flexing it out of its stiffened curl. It was amazing that a crow had not come down to abscond with the piece.

"Oh, Robin," Tharja said as she palmed and stroked the heavily-bruised pinky-finger. The flesh at the base of the bone at the base-joint had been shredded and slightly burned. It definitely had belonged to Robin, however. Tharja noted the delicate lilt of the finger – a refined mage's pinky. She gave the pad of the finger a light kiss before wrapping it in a soft handkerchief she had tucked into her bra-cup.

This could definitely be useful. Magical-dolls pinned with hair and spells done upon dandruff or soiled bandages were one thing – having a whole hank of a person's body was entirely another. She would definitely think of something creative to do wit it later.

Tharja secretly kept a little inkpot in her tent filled with warm water and covered with gauze within which she macerated the severed finger to bring out the bones. Allowing a slow rot in water was often the only way to preserve the smallest and most delicate of bones. The sorceress was careful to mask any smells in a way that no one was tipped off to anything other than perhaps a bit of overlooked garbage carelessly left in a tent whenever the company moved. She teased the bones and joint out and carefully cleaned them, placing them in a vial, which she strung upon a leather cord to keep close to her heart.

No matter where or when she was, she'd always have a part of Robin with her, whether Robin liked it or not. Every beat of the dark mage's calm heart jostled, however slightly, the gray bones in the tiny jar, hidden beneath her bra. For her part, Tharja hid the fact that she carried a bit of Robin with her from the tactician, as well as everyone else.

For her part, Robin recovered well. She not only healed down to an odd stump on the bottom of her right hand, she found ways to compensate for all of the intricate finger-movements required to cast will into spells. In fact, the loss of a finger did not seem to slow her down at all. On the contrary, she seemed to invent new ways to use elemental tomes through having to allow for the absence of the appendage.

Fate was cruel and the day came when Robin became a sacrifice to Grima. The Shepherds met the dragon for a final battle after being warned by Naga that there were two paths to the dark dragon's defeat, both carrying a high price. If Lord Chrom struck the final blow against the beast, Grima would meet death, but with the possibility of returning to the land in one-thousand years, which would leave future generations to solve the problem after them. The other option involved Robin unmaking herself to bring the dragon to a permanent death – Grima would face eternal defeat, but it would cost her life.

These options were discussed among the Shepherds before the away-team found themselves a-dragon-back. No one who knew of the possibilities wanted Robin to leave them. They begged her to let Chrom make the death-stroke. She, herself, was conflicted. She had a family to live for – a baby newly born back in the capital, no less. She agreed that noble sacrifices worked well on-paper, but it was a far different matter when actually faced with the possibility and the task. She did not fear death – so she said – it was just that she had things to live for and knew that she was needed. She stayed up late into the night discussing matters with Chrom and with Lucina (she dared not discuss anything with her doting son, Morgan). She wanted to believe in the possibility that future generations would do things right, keep peace among the lands and keep Grima from rising.

In the end, her faith, perhaps, was little, while her courage was strong. She brought up a new form of magic against her weakened doppelganger and let fly. She ignored the shouts of her family – Lucina's surprised yelp, the desperate cry of Chrom and the agonized scream of Morgan, as well as the noises and dismay of the other Shepherds – her family, too, in their own right.

Tharja watched her disappear like a dried-out Risen. It was, as far as death went, one of the most peaceful she'd ever seen. All Robin did was fade, raising her crippled hand in solidarity and wearing a big fake smile. The dark mage angrily groused that people were only sent off by her by her whim and therefore, she had to come back – or else.

Not that she knew what "else" was. The Shepherds parted ways and Tharja did not have much of a place to go to. She wandered around the refugee camps for a while and lurked in the streets by the palace. She took up life with her man-toy and her twitchy futurescape-daughter. Naga had said that there might be a way for Robin to return to life. As far as Tharja was concerned in regards to gods that were never her own and their promises, Robin was dead. All she had left of that perfect woman was a set of bones in a vial. They had stayed even as Robin had faded. Tharja did not take this as a promise of any kind like some others might have – she merely acknowledged a non-fatal injury and its remains as differing from a final death.

All the same, when she felt lonely, overly mopey or even just cold, Tharja would clutch the vial. She would hold it close to her chest and kiss it occasionally. She felt that the bones had a resonance to them. She could feel Robin, even though Robin wasn't there. Occasionally, she'd take the bones out of the vial and sniff them or even delicately lick their ends – anything to feel close to that brain and that beauty.

She had saved Robin's bones and, in turn, Robin's bones saved her – regardless of her already questionable sanity before the grief hit.

Tharja tried casting spells on the former pinky, desperate to raise a communication with the other side. All she received in return was silence. "Oh, ignoring me again, Robin?" she'd ask as she fiddled with her hexing tools upon a desk.

Two years after the final battle, Chrom and Lissa found a groggy phoenix in a field. Robin had returned, sleepy and disoriented but with memories of her former life – from the first time she'd been found in a field to the sacrifice to seal the dragon. Tharja knew from her place in a foreign land. She could feel the bones vibrate ever so subtly. Without warning or preparation, she made ready to travel to the interior of Ylisse.

When she met Robin, she saw that her hand had been healed completely, the missing pinky restored. Her significant mark had disappeared as well. She was free and whole and, for her part, even as the dark mage glared in jealousy at Chrom, Tharja was happy for her. Life without war began for all of them.

Tharja was left clutching her secret vial of bones.

Robin would always be, in part hers, although she wouldn't know it.

* * *

 **END.**


End file.
